Europe (Probably a stupid question, but...)

In my mind it is no different than using German or Spanish when you are driving around in the US.

There may be times where it is helpful to be in the native language to match the signs, but for me I would stick to english. That way I don't miss any left, right or exit commands.

dk

Only if you speak all those languages... If you load it, it will give you directions (TTS) in that language.

I hope you're multi-lingual.

Well, maybe I'm missing something, but my Nuvi 260 shows three choices under "settings", "language": Voice, Text & Keyboard.

I was thinking I might need Keyboard to be able to input the odd German characters

If you are going to Europe for that long it would be great to get the language guide. I did and we could not set the temperature control of our room because we couldn't read it. I got garmin out, put the words in the dictionary and knew just what they said and set the room. Couldn't have done it without it. Also, it was nice to look up a few words to say.
You can look up foreign words and they will translate back to english or look up english words to translate to the language you want. It was a lot of help to us. Well worth the money

Wow.

I'd never even heard of the Garmin Language Guide. After a quick lookup, I don't believe the Nuvi 260 I'd planned to take is supported. Guess I could pack the Nuvi 1490T instead, but it's bigger than I'd like to take.

Roy

Looks like it doesn't work with either of your units. I have the same two so I'm SOL too.

Here's the product page
https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?pID=1280

Click on the Products tab to see which units are compatible.

I lived in the EU for several years. Use the language that is native to you. In difficult traffic situations, like roundabouts (Cruce giratorio), you need to react according to the language you are use to AND QUICKLY! Otherwise, you risk an accident.

If I understand your question correctly then I think yes, you should load all those languages, at least their keyboard form. Otherwise you will not be able to enter correct addresses. For example in German you have letters like: ü, ä, ö and ß that don't show in English alphabet.

...knowing I would be traveling in Europe quite often...well worth it!

just whatyou do.. Let us kow what your desion is and then When you return tell us what you did and the out come ifyour desion. would be great to know just what happends..

I loaded current keyboard languages for Germany, France & Italy. If I understand correctly, I'm leaving the Voice and Text outputs in US English, but will set the keyboard input to whatever country I'm in.

As "hercegovac" pointed out (Thanks), you need the specific local characters to be able to enter local addresses.

So, I think I'll be able to enter the address in German, but hear and read the routing directions in English.

I'll confirm this after arrival.

Thanks again,

Roy

Let us know how you come out. I didn't think of the special characters in my earlier comments.

Daniel

Well, after the last three weeks in Germany, Austria, Italy and France, I have yet to need any other languages on the Garmin 260. German has some special characters, but they haven't been required to input the addresses I've input.

Biggest problem we've seen have been with round-a-bouts, of which there are very many, especially in Italy. The Garmin will say "take the third exit", for instance. Even with both of us counting, 50% of the time, it's really exit two or four.

Having said that, the Garmin has been invaluable this trip. I'll never drive in Europe again without one.

Thanks for your comments and/or suggestions.

Roy Adams

I used mine in Switzerland and France last Spring and didn't have that problem. In fact, the count was right all the times. It's a very useful feature as sometimes the signs aren't too clear on which exit goes where.